Stupidity is not a disability

Mayor criticizes DA for Rabbi abuse-gatekeepers

NYTimes   Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg on Friday sharply criticized the Brooklyn district attorney, Charles J. Hynes, over his handling of child sexual abuse cases among the borough’s large ultra-Orthodox Jewish community.

Mr. Bloomberg said through a spokesman that he “completely disagrees” with Mr. Hynes’s decision to not object to the position of an influential ultra-Orthodox advocacy group on reporting allegations of child sexual abuse. The group announced last year that adherent Jews must obtain permission from a rabbi before reporting such allegations to district attorneys or the police.

Being a parent to a sex offender

CNN   Christine Smith will never forget the moment she watched her 21-year-old son being led out of a Florida courtroom in handcuffs.

"This is not happening, this is not happening, this is not happening," she recalls thinking at the time. "Take me instead."

She sobbed because there was nothing she could do. Matthew, the second of her three children, was going to prison after pleading guilty to 10 counts of possession of child pornography. A judge in Duval County sentenced him in April 2010 to 18 months in state prison and one year of probation, with the requirement that he register as a sex offender.

What's the "Torah" in "Torah miSinai"?

Guest post: by Rabbi Raffi Bilek a social worker and rabbi living in Passaic, NJ. who wrote a chapter in my Child &Domestic Abuse Vol 1

I am writing a chapter about Orthodox Judaism in a book that will be read primarily by non-Jews.  Right at the beginning I wanted to put down "Torah miSinai" as one of its defining characteristics.  Then I realized I had to define what "Torah" means in this context, since it is not merely referring to the Chumash or the Tanach, which is probably what most people would assume (if they have any familiarity with the word "Torah" in the first place). THEN I realized that defining it here is not such an easy task at all!  Torah can also refer to the entire corpus of Jewish law and thinking - but that can't be said to have been given over at Sinai.  And it also doesn't seem correct to say that Torah miSinai is referring to whatever portion of the written Torah was actually handed down at that time.  So what is it?

R' Eidensohn was gracious enough to let me turn it over to the klal to see what others think. It's an interesting question, at any rate.

[update] I put a number of translations of the classic seforim in the comments section that deal with the issue. They are part of a future volume of Daas Torah which discusses the nature of Torah and the Revelation at Sinai

Does ORA want halacha changed?

*Do ORA and its supporters believe that halacha should be changed so that a get can be given or received with the consent of only one spouse?* [guest post]

Asked whether rabbis could just agree to permit a religious divorce without the man's consent, [Rabbi Shmuel] Herzfeld said, "It's very complicated."

...

He [ORA’s Rabbi Jeremy Stern] said the Jewish community certainly has started to discuss whether a rabbi should be able to officiate a divorce without one party's permission -- but said the community "is not at a point right now where they're willing to fundamentally change how Jewish marriage

and divorce works."

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/02/29/congressman-facing-pressure-from-jewish-groups-on-advisers-religious-divorce/#ixzz1uYp26Mpq

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Rachel Levmore’s May 11 op-ed, “Should the Government ‘Get’ Involved,” raises a multitude of questions.

Let me address just two points. Levmore errs in stating that the proposed Maryland “barriers to remarriage” law would have protected Tamar Epstein from becoming an agunah. Epstein filed for the civil divorce and has done all she can to remove barriers to her ex-husband Aharon Friedman’s remarriage. Thus even if Maryland had passed the proposed law, Epstein would rightly have been awarded the civil divorce she sought but remained an agunah. [Rabbi Jeremy Stern has repeatedly and falsely claimed (although not on ORA's website) that it was Friedman who filed for divorce.] Maryland’s proposed “barriers to remarriage” law, similar to the first New York State “Get Law,” only helps if the husband is the plaintiff in the civil divorce suit. In 99% of agunah cases, the wife, not the husband, is the plaintiff. The second NYS Get law, which allows the judge to give the agunah a larger financial award, has some teeth, but the Maryland law was not patterned on this second law.

Levmore also states that Aharon Friedman, exercising his constitutional right, has turned Epstein into an agunah, but it is the Orthodox rabbinate’s refusal to embrace available halachic remedies to the agunah problem and the communtiy that keeps these rabbis in leadership positions and adheres to their decrees who have turned Epstein into an agunah. Susan Aranoff Director, Agunah International  http://forward.com/articles/156105/getting-a-get/#ixzz1uYpX92cp

Psak: Choosing vs avoiding error - consequences

Amongst the heated debate that has been going on regarding get me'usa - more subtle issues have been ignored. We addressed the issue of whether we posken like the Rambam (Hilchos Ishus 14:8), that a husband can be forced to give a get in a case of ma'us alei or like Rabbeinu Tam, that force can't be used and if it is used you have a problem of mamzerim. While it is clear that we don't posken like Rambam - there are a number of unclear areas. For example what happens if the husband were forced to give a get and then his wife remarried? If the get was invalid she shouldn't be allowed to remarry and if she does  - the marriage would not be valid and future children would be mamzerim. One of the sources that is cited in this question is the following Rosh.

Rosh(43:6):  Question:  A woman has been married for many year and has children. Now she is saying that he disgusts her (ma’us alei). Do we force the husband to give a get? Answer:  Even though the Rambam writes, When the wife says ma’us alei we force the husband to give her a get – but Rabbeinu Tam and the Ri disagree. Since this is a dispute amongst rabbinic authorities why should we stick our heads amongst the great mountains and to make a forced get which is not required by the halacha and to permit a married woman to remarry? Furthermore due to our sins, Jewish women today have loose morality. Therefore there is concern that the wife might be interested in another man. Whoever forces a husband to give a get when the wife says ma’us alei is simply multiplying mamzerim. All of this is in regard to what to do if asked. However if the get has been forced already – if they relied on the view of the Rambam – what has been done has been done.

Question: What is the Rosh doing here in regards to deciding between the Rambam and Rabbeinu Tam? 

Answer: In fact  he isn't deciding between them and doesn't want to. It seems therefore he is following the assertion found in the introduction to Ohr LeTzion of Rav Bentzion Abba Shaul that psak is a not a clear categorization of what is true and what is false but rather it is a strategy to minimize error and harm. He says only in the case of the Shulchan Aruch because it was accepted by clall Yisroel and the Arizal because he spoke with ruach hakodesh - are their rulings absolute decisions of truth. While it seems clear that the Rosh is doing a cost benefits analysis - other poskim such as Rabbeinu Tam, Ramban Shulchan Aruch etc are clearly rejecting the Rambam and saying that he is wrong!

It would seem that in our time - after the Rambam has been rejected and Rabbeinu Tam accepted - that the ambivalent view of the Rosh would not be relevant. However it is cited by contemporary poskim such as Rav Ovadia Yosef  to explain why the wife can remain married to her second husband - despite receiving an inappropriately forced get from the first.

An explanation might be that contemporary poskim are also doing a cost benefits analysis rather than deciding what is true. Thus they take the conservative approach of Rabbeinu Tam and don't allow the husband to be forced because they are worried about the possibility of mamzerim if Rambam is wrong. They would also say that a wife divorced by a forced get could not get married with that get.

 However if she does get married we have a different problem. There is now a marriage and possibly children. Thus we would definitely have adultery and mamzerim if we had absolutely rejected the Rambam. Therefore we turn around and say - we didn't absolutely reject the Rambam but that he is not the normative lchatchila position.  However when faced with the disaster of adultery and mamzerim we say the Rambam can be relied upon bedieved.

To get back to our problem of using force in ma'us alei. The guiding principle that we seem to be using is that we need to avoid the possibility of an invalid get and thus mamzerim if Rambam is wrong. Therefore all our actions need to be based on the rejection of the Rambam and thus we avoid any appearance of forcing the get. However if there is a forced get  - then bedieved we would rely on the Rambam that there is no problem of aishis ish and mamzerim - because there is no other way.

Assuming that is really the halachic dynamic - what would be the practical status of children resulting from remarriage? If you had a choice between a possible zivug with a person for whom there was never a question of yichus versus one for whom the valid is solely because there was a pesak that bedieved the child is kosher - which would you chose? In other words which would you chose - glatt kosher in which there has never been a sofek or regular kosher which had a number of questions that were resolved by a rabbi's heter that took 10 pages of reasoning to justify and that other rabbis don't accept?

This issue of perceived quality of yichus is also a consideration - at least l'chatchila - in how we conduct ourselves. In other words we should avoid doing anything which raises halachic questions of yichus - unless there are other issues which are more important.

In addition there are contemporary poskim who view the Rambam has rejected totally and they problably would require that the wife not only not remarry after a forced get but that if she did then she could not stay in the marriage and that children from the second marriage would be mamzerim. 

Abuse:Falsely arrested & smeared

NYTimes    “Cops Nab the Grope Sicko,” the headline in The Daily News announced, and The New York Post described him as the “dapper fiend.” The Web site Jezebel posted an article about his arrest that drew lacerating comments on how Mr. Vanderwoude was possessed of a sense of entitlement that went with his job in private finance.

But Karl Vanderwoude wasn’t on 67th Street when one of the attacks took place; he was at his desk, sending e-mails, and seen on video opening a door for lunch deliveries. He wasn’t behind City Hall another time, but out to dinner with two people in Greenwich Village, and they had receipts from the cab and restaurant to back it up. 

All charges were dropped this week, and prosecutors announced that Mr. Vanderwoude could not have been the attacker. “The Police Department agrees,” Paul J. Browne, the department’s chief spokesman, said Thursday.

This was the criminal justice equivalent of a plane crashing, brought down in a publicity hurricane. Wrong man arrested and smeared; right man still out there. Could it have been prevented?

Chareidi Abuse: D.A. has different rules

NYTimes    Marci A. Hamilton, a professor of constitutional law at Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law at Yeshiva University, blamed Mr. Hynes for not speaking out against the ultra-Orthodox position that mandates that allegations must be first reported to rabbis. The position potentially flouts a state law that requires teachers, social workers and others to report allegations of sexual abuse immediately to the authorities.

She said Mr. Hynes was essentially allowing rabbis to act as gatekeepers. 

“That’s exactly what the Catholic Church did, what the Latter-day Saints did, what the Jehovah’s Witnesses did,” said Ms. Hamilton, author of “Justice Denied: What America Must Do to Protect Its Children.”

 

Victims’ rights groups say Mr. Hynes has also failed to take a strong stand against rabbis and institutions that have covered up abuse, and has not brought charges recently against community members who have sometimes pressed victims’ families not to testify. 

Ms. White, his liaison to the ultra-Orthodox Jewish community, said the district attorney had few options, in part because some victims declined to implicate those who threatened them, fearful that if they did, they would face even more pressure. 

“I always feel so bad for those parents, because you watch the shock on their face when they find out that their child has been abused, and then they get all of the pressure,” Ms. White said.

Head of massive prostitution ring gets 18 years in prison

YNET   "We've yet to see a case that compares in its severity to Rami Saban's activity," Tel Aviv District Court Judge Khaled Kabub said Thursday before sentencing the head of a massive human-trafficking ring to 18 years and seven months in prison.

Justice Kaboub called the operation “one of the most complex and extensive human-trafficking affairs to be uncovered in recent years, if not ever."

According to the indictment, the defendants smuggled hundreds of women into Israel through the border with Egypt. They used a network which located hundreds of young women in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova, and Uzbekistan.

Judge M. Elon: Harchakos are passive sanctions

Justice Menachem Elon (Status of Women page 349): The parameters of the harchokos of Rabbeinu Tam are accurately described by Ariel Rozen-Tzvi: “The sanction of harchokos - whose source is in the teshuvos of Rabbeinu Tam – is separation, distancing and withholding. In other words, they are passive activities involving not doing something (shev v’ahl ta’aseh). In contrast kefiya (force) and also nidoi (shunning) require active steps. According to Rabbeinu Tam the harchokos are not considered force. Rabbeinu Tam chose an indirect path in circumstances where beis din preferred to avoid force. The harchokos are a withholding of the benefits of society. It is directed to the actions of the community and not the husband. Many other poskim followed in the footsteps of Rabbeinu Tam. However there were other poskim who viewed the haricots as also a type of force and therefore they should only be applied when force is permitted.”

Judge M. Elon: Prison to force a Get

Judge Menachem Elon (The Status of Women  2005 page 299-301): [translated by Daniel Eidensohn] In Israel there is a legal procedure which had been ratified by Kenesset in 1953 which is a potential solution [to the case of Aguna where the husband refuses to give a get]. According to section 6 of the law concerning rabbinic courts dealing with marriage and divorce of 1953 – “A rabbinic court can rule that a husband can be forced to give his wife or the wife can be ordered to accept a get from her husband. After 6 months the district secular court has the ability - with the request of the legal adviser of the government - to use imprisonment as a means of getting the husband to comply with the beis din’s ruling.” Without question this seems to be a very powerful tool that the secular government has given to the rabbinic courts in order to solve the problem of a husband refusing to give his wife a get – after the beis din issues a ruling requiring him to do so.

In reality however this almost never happens. Let me explain my words. According to the section of the law, it is possible to imprison the husband in a case where the beis din has ordered that the husband be forced to give a get. However if the beis din only issues a ruling that the husband is obligated to give a get - and sometimes the language is even weaker and they simply say that it is a mitzva to give a get or that it is proper to give a get – then it is not allowed to imprison the recalcitrant husband. The reason that the law requires that the beis din specifies that the husband is to be forced before he can be imprisonedis in order to avoid the possibility of a get me’usa. A get me’usa is a get which is coerced against the will of the husband and is thus invalid. There are only a limited number of cases where force can used in giving a get according to the halacha. Thus it is understandable why the secular law included a clause that a husband can not be imprisoned when he refuses to give a get except when the rabbinic court rules that it is necessary to force him to give a get.

In fact the rabbinic courts very rarely issue a psak which says to force get. In the overwhelming majority of cases it simply says that there is an obligation to give the get or languae which is even milder. That is consistent with the view of those religious authorities that one does not psaken to force a get except in a small number of rare cases which are explicitly mentioned in the Talmud.

This issue is in fact a dispute amongst halachic authorities. According to the Rambam and those authorities who agree with him – not only can a get be forced in the cases in the Talmud and other classic sources – but also in the case where the wife claims “ma’us alei” - that she says he disgusts her and therefore she can not have sexual relations with him. Therefore the husband can be forced to divorce her because “she is not like a captive who is forced to have sexual relations with somone she despises.” However many halachic authorities – led by Rabbeinu Tam- disagree with the Rambam. According to their view when the wife claims “ma’us alei” this is not a justification to force the husband to give his wife a get. The acceptance of the view of the Rambam as the normative halacha – which in fact happened amongst certain Sefardic poskim and the Yeminite community – has the potential to be a major solution to the issue of aguna which results when the husband refuses to give a get. It enables the utilization of prison which was established as law for the rabbinic courts.

However the refusal of the rabbinic courts to utilize the view of the Rambam and because of that the refusal to write in their rulings that the husband is to be forced - causes at times a difficult tragedy for the wife. She remains an aguna for many years and she is vulnerable to extortion and revenge from the husband. It is important to note that this tragic suffering is basically only for the wife when the husband refuses to give a get. The cases where the wife refuses to accept the get to extort money from the husband or for revenge can be solved by the procedure called heter me’ah rabbonim. Upon receiving this heter the husband is able to remarry even if the wife hasn’t accepted the get. However as is well known, such a solution doesn’t exist to free the wife when the husband refuses to give a get.

Shunning those who report abuse

NYTimes   By cooperating with the police, and speaking out about his son’s abuse, Mr. Jungreis, 38, found himself at the painful forefront of an issue roiling his insular Hasidic community. There have been glimmers of change as a small number of ultra-Orthodox Jews, taking on longstanding religious and cultural norms, have begun to report child sexual abuse accusations against members of their own communities. But those who come forward often encounter intense intimidation from their neighbors and from rabbinical authorities, aimed at pressuring them to drop their cases. 

Abuse victims and their families have been expelled from religious schools and synagogues, shunned by fellow ultra-Orthodox Jews and targeted for harassment intended to destroy their businesses. Some victims’ families have been offered money, ostensibly to help pay for therapy for the victims, but also to stop pursuing charges, victims and victims’ advocates said.

“Try living for one day with all the pain I am living with,” Mr. Jungreis, spent and distraught, said recently outside his new apartment on Williamsburg’s outskirts. “Did anybody in the Hasidic community in these two years, in Borough Park, in Flatbush, ever come up and look my son in the eye and tell him a good word? Did anybody take the courage to show him mercy in the street?”

Bare-bones Jewish marriage

In the course of our discussion of divorce - the question was raised as to what are the bare minimum requirements for a Jewish marriage. This is not the ideal or nor is it likely to be a pleasant relationship The Rambam lists them as follows [the translation is that of Rabbi Eliyahu Tougher which is available on the Chabad webpage]

Rambam (Hilchos Ishus 12:1-3): 1) When a man marries a woman, whether she is a virgin or a non-virgin, whether she is above the age of majority or a minor, and whether she was born Jewish, is a convert or a freed slave, he incurs ten responsibilities toward her and receives four privileges 2)With regard to his ten responsibilities: three stem from the Torah. They include sha'arah, kesutah v'onatah. Sha'arah means providing her with subsistence; Kesutah means supplying her with garments, and onatah refers to conjugal rights. The seven responsibilities ordained by the Rabbis are all conditions [of the marriage contract] established by the court. The first is the fundamental requirement of the marriage contract. The others are referred to as t'na'ei , the conditions of the marriage contract. They are:a) to provide medical treatment if she becomes sick; b) to redeem her if she is held captive:c) to bury her if she dies;d) the right for her to continue living in his home after his death as long as she remains a widow;e) the right for her daughters to receive their subsistence from his estate after his death until they become consecrated;f) the right for her sons to inherit her ketubah in addition to their share in her husband's estate together with their brothers [borne by other wives, if she dies before her husband does].3) The four privileges that the husband is granted are all Rabbinic in origin. They are: a) the right to the fruits of her labor; b) the right to any ownerless object she discovers; c) the right to benefit from the profits of her property during her lifetime; d) the right to inherit her [property] if she dies during his lifetime. His rights to her property supersede [the rights of] all others.

In addition because she is acquired by her husband in the marriage process she is subservient to him and she is required to provide sexual relations to him. Rashi(Nedarim 15b): Rav Kahana said that a wife who takes an oath to prohibit sexual relations with her husband – she is forced and has sexual relations with him because she has no ability to prohibit herself since she is subservient to his pleasure. While she can not be forced to have sexual intercourse with him a wife who refuses to have sexual intercourse with her husband is labeled a moredes and it is grounds for divorce. Likewise if he refuses to fulfill his Torah obligation to have sexual intercourse it is also grounds for divorce.

This subservience of the woman to the man is reflected in the following:

(Hilchos Ishus 13:11): …A woman should be given proper clothing to go the house of her father or to the house of mourning or to a banquet. That is because every woman should visit her father’s house or visit the house of mourning or a banquet as well as show kindness to her friends and relatives in order that they should reciprocate with her. She is not a prisoner in her house that she is not free to come and go. However it is a degrading thing if she is always going outside - sometimes just outside and at other times into the streets. It is necessary that the husband restrains his wife from this and not let his wife go out except once a month or perhaps twice a month according to need. That is because the beauty of a woman is to sit in the corner of her house as it says in Tehilim (45:14): All the honor of the king’s daughter is inside.

Rambam(Hilchos Ishus 15:18): Similarly, our Sages commanded a woman to conduct herself modestly at home, not to proliferate levity or frivolity before her husband, not to request intimacy verbally, nor to speak about this matter. She should not deny her husband [intimacy] to cause him anguish, so that he should increase his love for her. Instead, she should oblige him whenever he desires. She should keep her distance from his relatives and the members of his household so that he will not be provoked by jealousy and should avoid scandalous situations - indeed, any trace of scandal.

Rambam( Hilchos Ishus 15:20): And similarly, they commanded a woman to honor her husband exceedingly and to be in awe of him. She should carry out all her deeds according to his directives, considering him to be an officer or a king. She should follow the desires of his heart and shun everything that he disdains.This is the custom of holy and pure Jewish women and men in their marriages. And these ways will make their marriage pleasant and praiseworthy.
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however the man has obligations to her

Rambam(Hilchos Ishus 15:19): Similarly, our Sages commanded that a man honor his wife more than his own person, and love her as he loves his own person. If he has financial resources, he should offer her benefits in accordance with his resources. He should not cast a superfluous measure of fear over her. He should talk with her gently, being neither sad nor angry.

Rav Steinman:Reject kids who are wrong type?!